Graduate Landscape Architecture student, Haley Powell, is spending her summer getting some valuable experience as an intern at The Broussard Group (TBG) in Dallas. At TBG, she is completing a multitude of tasks including drafting in CAD (computer aided design), designing paving patterns, developing sheet sets for a submittal, and many other things to help a client understand the concepts of a design.
“It is a great situation to learn about design throughout the life of a project and really see the depth of work that goes into seeing a project come into existence.”
— Haley Powell
During her internship, she has gained valuable technical skills, but more importantly, she has learned ‘soft skills,’ she explained. Soft skills she has learned include learning how to operate in a professional landscape architecture environment, what actual projects look like and how budgets or clients affects them, and more.
“I would urge all landscape architecture students to get an internship, because nothing else on your resume will be as helpful as meaningful work experience.”
In preparation for her internship, Powell says she gained valuable experience here at Gibbs College of Architecture.
“My professors all genuinely cared about me and my program of study, and were willing to cater to our individual interests and needs.”
This level of care and dedication helped shape her into an adaptable and effective professional, she said.
Powell decided to study landscape architecture because its applicability to today’s social climate is one of the best things about the profession, she says.
“Landscape architecture affords me the opportunity to improve people’s quality of life and benefit the environment and the way people experience it.”
It’s a degree that offers so many possibilities, and all of them can make a positive impact on people’s quality of life in some way, she explains.
One project that she’s most proud of during her time at GCA is a tea garden for the Asian District.
Haley Powell’s Tea Garden
“While I think it is very far from perfect and there are things I would change now, I pushed myself hard on it and [it] shows a lot of growth in how I approach projects,” she says.
Working hard and giving a project your all is exactly the type of approach that Powell says is essential for incoming students to utilize. The ability to both refine one’s skills and learn quickly is what will decide success.
A project designed by Gibbs College of Architecture faculty member Austin Lightle has been selected for BuildFest 2026, a national art and architecture festival held at the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts in New York, on the historic grounds of the 1969 Woodstock Music Festival.
Two Christopher C. Gibbs College of Architecture alumni are helping shape recommendations that could influence affordable housing design and construction across Oklahoma.
The University of Oklahoma Libraries recently welcomed Carl Siegel as an Architecture Librarian and Archivist and Assistant Professor. In his role, Siegel supports students, faculty and staff across the Gibbs College of Architecture while also serving as archivist for the American School of Architecture Archives.
